Need by Joelle Charbonneau

High school teenagers begin getting invitations to join a social network site.  They have to, in turn, invite five other friends to join.  When they do, the site - NEED - will fulfill a request, seemingly free of charge ("What do you NEED?").  Of course, nothing is ever really free, and soon NEED members are being asked to perform small tasks in exchange for something they request.  But when the tasks get more dangerous and begin to have real consequences, the teens must begin to question their ethics and sense of right and wrong.  Are those concert tickets really worth it?  How far would you be willing to go?

I liked the premise of this book.  In today's social media age, it's not so far-fetched to imagine a scenario like this in real life.  What ultimately turned me off from this book was the explanation at the end of who/what was behind NEED.  I won't spoil it here, but I didn't buy it.  If this book was more dystopian/science fiction, then maybe.  But this is firmly realistic mystery fiction and I didn't believe the "big reveal."  Too bad, because this one had potential.

This is Where it Ends, by Marieke Nijkamp

Where to begin with this book?  I'm writing this review as the flags fly half-staff for the school shootings in Oregon.  Reading This is Where it Ends was obviously highly unsettling and uncomfortable.  We all know this story.  We know this story because it keeps appearing on the news.  It's happened before and sadly, will probably keep happening again.  I realize author Marieke Nijkamp didn't write this book hoping for something like Oregon to happen to give her story a sense of urgency.  Still, the timing will make this title fly off the shelves.

This is Where it Ends begins on an ordinary morning in Opportunity, Alabama.  The author uses multiple narrators who are all in different locations around the school: Autumn, a ballerina, and her girlfriend, Sylvia, are in the school auditorium for morning assembly.  Sylvia's brother, Tomás, and his friend Fareed, are using the fact that the entire school staff is at the assembly to break into the principal's office.  Claire has track practice and isn't at assembly either, although her brother Matt is.

Nijkamp switches between these characters, their perspectives interspersed with social media posts and text messages from other individuals inside and outside of the school.  The five main characters in particular are all connected by a relationship to Tyler, Autumn's brother.  When Tyler locks the students and staff in the auditorium and begins shooting, the scenario becomes all too real. 

The story unfolds over less than an hour's time, but somehow it feels longer.  I understand why the author would want to tell this story from multiple points of view.  After all, when something like this happens in real life, the news and social media seems quick to point fingers at who's to blame.  How could no one see this coming? How did no one stop it before it got too far?  The reality, of course, is that there are no easy answers.

Here's the thing.  I didn't really like this book very much.  It wasn't the violence, although that was certainly upsetting.  I just found parts of it to be highly unbelievable.  Tyler begins shooting at 10:05 a.m.  The police and SWAT team don't arrive on scene until about 30 minutes later.  REALLY???? When the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary occurred, police were on scene four minutes after the 911 call.  I do not believe that it would take police half an hour to respond to a school emergency. 

Secondly, when the book opens, Tomás and Fareed are able to break into the principal's office because the entire faculty and staff is at the principal's assembly.  ON WHAT PLANET is the front office of a school left sitting empty for someone to just waltz in? 

Finally, near the end, three characters escape from the auditorium.  However, for reasons that are murky and incomprehensible, they don't run outside. They think that the only means of escape is to go upstairs to a classroom that has a window leading onto the roof.  I didn't understand this either.  Despite the fact that dozens of students have managed to slip away from the auditorium before them, why did this group feel like they had to make this choice? 

Such glaring issues keep me from fully recommending this title.  Jennifer Brown's Hate List and Jodi Picoult's Nineteen Minutes have already addressed this topic.  I don't feel that This is Where it Ends brings much more to the table, other than having a cast of diverse characters.  I am all for diversity in YA lit, by the way.  But it has to feel natural to the story and the setting.  I felt like the author was trying a little too hard to check off all the diversity boxes.

Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon

 I can't think of too many books this year that have been met with as much advanced buzz as Everything, Everything, the debut from Nicola Yoon.  Ever since the wild success of The Fault in our Stars back in 2012, publishers and audiences have been clamoring for the next romance with a "hook," which this title delivers: 18-year-old Madeline lives a life of solitude.  She's never been to school, never learned to drive, never taken a vacation.  Maddie suffers from Severe Combined Immunodeficiency, also known as "bubble boy disease."  Because any small element outside of her sterilized environment could trigger a massive attack or illness, she spends all her time indoors with her mother and her nurse. 
Maddie spends lots of time looking out her window at the house next door, eventually catching the attention of her cute neighbor, Ollie.  He writes his email address on the window pane, and soon the two begin emailing and instant messaging.  When that doesn't become enough, Maddie's nurse, Carla, begins sneaking Ollie inside the house (after going through decontamination) for short visits in person.

One thing I liked about Everything, Everything is the format; it's not just straight prose, but includes diary entries, IM chat transcripts, sketches, and so forth.  It makes for a very quick, accessible read.  Madeline and Ollie are both sweet, likeable characters, even though you know their relationship will only spell trouble in the end.  My biggest complaint, however, was the unlikely "twist" at the end.  It defied credulity and was something of a let down for me.  The ending felt rushed and a little too tidy.  Nevertheless, this title should find a big audience with teens.

The Great American Whatever, by Tim Federle

The Great American Whatever marks author Tim Federle's debut in YA fiction.  Federle is also the author of the middle grade novels Better Nate Than Ever and Five, Six, Seven, Nate!.  (He's also written cocktail books for adults, one of which is called Tequila Mockingbird which wins for best punny title).  In his few published works thus far, Federle writes what he knows.  In the Nate books, he used his own experiences on Broadway to write about a boy who wants to make in on the Big White Way.  In this newest work, we follow the journey of seventeen-year-old Quinn, a closeted movie buff from Pittsburgh (Federle's home town).  I give this little bit of backstory because as much as I wanted to embrace The Great American Whatever, it felt a little distant for me.  I never found Quinn's voice to be fully authentic.  It sounded too much like adult-Tim in the guise of a teenager.  (In the acknowledgements at the end, Federle says that the book was initially written with the characters about ten years older.)

The Great American Whatever follows the first summer Quinn spends without his sister, Annabeth, who died in a texting-related car crash six months earlier.  Quinn and Annabeth were a filmmaking team; he wrote the screenplays and his sister directed.  Without her, Quinn feels desperately empty and lost.  He also feels responsible for the wreck that took her life, since he was the one she was texting.  Slowly, Quinn crawls out of his grief thanks to his best friend, Geoff, and a cute older boy he meets at a college party.  Peppered throughout the novel are sample screenplay directions, as Quinn imagines his life the way a filmmaker would:

EXT. GEOFF'S PERFECT LAWN - NIGHT

Quinn takes Geoff by the lapels and flings him onto the lawn.  He straddles Geoff and digs his knee right between Geoff's ribs.

QUINN

Seriously.  Explain yourself so that I don't freak out.

Again, as much as I wanted to really love this book, it was only ok for me.  I think Federle needs a little more time to really find his voice in YA fiction.  This is a perfectly solid debut for older teens, but similar themes have been done explored elsewhere and with greater resonance in YA lit.

Dumplin' by Julie Murphy

After finishing Dumplin', I felt like my normally nonexistent Texas accent was just a little stronger.  I might have started droppin' some gs from the ends of words and speakin' just a little more slowly.   From the nuances of small-town Texas life, to our obnoxious Homecoming traditions of mums so big they're liable to swallow you whole, to the unspoken serenity that comes with settlin' down on a hot day with a large glass of iced tea, author Julie Murphy gets it right.  She also gets right the creation of her main character, the overweight Willowdean Dickson, whose outward confidence masks deep insecurities. 

Willowdean is a Dolly Parton-loving high schooler, still reeling a year later from the death of her beloved aunt.  Her mother heads up the annual Texas Blue Bonnet Beauty Pageant, something Willowdean has always stayed as far away from as possible.  However, hurt that her mother has never once suggested that Willowdean might consider entering the pageant, she decides on a whim to enter.  What she doesn't expect is for her best friend and three other girls (who all suffer ridicule from their classmates for various reasons) to sign up as well.

Let me just say here y'all: I love to hate me some beauty pageants.  I think they are, really, The Worst.  But I would LOVE for a girl like Willowdean to show up just once, curves and all.  People throughout the book tell Willowdean that she's brave for entering the pageant.  "I don't want it to be brave," she says.  "I just want it to be normal."

Added to the mix are a couple of scenes where Willowdean and her oddball fellow contestants seek pageant tips from a local drag queen (a plot twist that is funny and sweet, but also a bit unrealistic.  I mean, out of the middle of west Texas is a gay bar that just happens to put on a Dolly Parton drag show?  Sure...). 

So much of Willowdean's journey was authentic and should resonate with teen readers.  Although mostly comfortable in her own skin, she still feels insecure about her body when it comes to boys and intimacy.  Even when presented with the chance to have it all with the boy she really likes, Willowdean nearly throws it all away because she can't imagine going to school every day and facing the other students.  Because no one would ever believe that a hot guy like that would possibly go for a girl like her, right?

Dumplin's a winner.  Toss your head back and throw your arms to the sky for this one.

Saint Anything, by Sarah Dessen

There are some authors in the YA world who are like comfort food: mac and cheese, your favorite hot beverage, etc.  Or maybe in the case of Sarah Dessen, pizza and garlic knots.  (I wanted to eat ALL THE PIZZA after reading this book.  Nom nom nom).  That being said, just because I'm comparing Dessen to pizza doesn't mean her books per se are necessarily comforting.  Dessen always serves up YA lit that is both true and challenging.  Her characters experience real problems that aren't always resolved in a neat bow in the end.  I think this is probably what makes her novels still so popular in all the school libraries where I've worked. 

Saint Anything is a bit darker and grittier than some of her previous books.  We open on high schooler Sydney, whose family has been thrown in disarray after her brother, Peyton, has been sentenced to jail for drunk driving.  He hit a young man, causing the boy permanent paralysis.  Peyton's shadow hangs solidly over the prep school they both attended, and Sydney is in desperate need for a fresh start, so she transfers to the local public school where no one knows her family history.

Things are home aren't much better.  Her father is emotionally absent, not taking much of a role in anything.  Her mother, on the other hand, is living in supreme denial of Peyton's crime.  Her number one priority involves Peyton's phone calls from jail and keeping track of everything going on at his penitentiary.  At one point she even calls the warden over some trifle issue.  The way she goes on, one would think Peyton's at summer camp and not jail.  No one in the family shows any remorse or guilt over what happened to the victim of Peyton's crime.  No one - except Sydney.  She feels she must carry the burden of guilt because someone has to.

It was very difficult to get through parts of this book, emotionally.  The mother drove me CRAZY.  I wanted someone to shake some sense into her.  (Peyton does, eventually).  Dessen also introduces us to Ames, one of Peyton's friends who takes an unhealthy liking to Sydney.  He's creepy and uncomfortable.  The fact that Sydney's parents are so blind to his actions was infuriating.  I hope teens reading this book WILL TELL SOMEONE if they are put into a similar situation.  It was hard to believe that no adult did anything about Ames until the end of the novel.  Ugh.

Still, so much of Sydney's path to personal healing and reconciliation with her brother rings true.  She meets a group of students at school who embrace her and don't pass judgment on her family.  She slowly begins to fall in love for the first time.  She seeks advice from her friend Layla's mother, since her own mother is so emotionally absent.  She doesn't like talking on the phone to Peyton, until she discovers they both watch the same Real Housewives-esque reality show, and the ice begins to thaw between them.

I think Dessen tries a little too hard to wrap everything up neatly.  The ending felt a bit rushed and the conclusions forced.  Still, I have no doubt that this book will be snapped up by Dessen's fans, as it should be. 

None of the Above, by I.W. Gregorio

It's senior year for Kristen Lattimer.  She's just been crowned Homecoming Queen and is looking at a track scholarship to college next year.  The night after the Homecoming dance, Kristen decides it's time to lose her virginity to her boyfriend Sam.  What should be a romantic night is ruined when she experiences terrible, agonizing pain.  This leads her to seek a gynecological exam.  The news is shocking: Kristen is intersex.

Although outwardly she looks like a girl, she has no uterus, and blood tests show that her chromosomes read XY.  Thus begins Kristen's painful journey of discovery: not only to learn more about her diagnosis, but to learn just what defines one's gender.

At first Kristen tells no one - not even Sam - about her diagnosis.  However, one drunken night, she spills the beans to her two best friends, Vee and Faith.  Soon the news is spread all over school, and the bullying begins, both at school and online.  Even her track coach says Kristen cannot participate with the track team because other schools have filed complaints about cheating.

The author of None of the Above, I.W. Gregorio, is herself a surgeon, and her medical knowledge comes through in the scenes with Kristen and her doctors.  I felt that these scenes, although factual, were a little too dry in their exposition.  It's quite obvious that Gregorio is trying to educate the reader by dispelling many rumors and myths about those who are intersex.  There are other plot points that seem a bit too pat, as if she was going through a check sheet of YA tropes: Homecoming queen? Check.  Happens to be reading Merchant of Venice is English class with its themes of gender identity?  Check.  Parent who is supportive but distant?  Check.

I like that this book explores an issue so rarely discussed in YA lit.  Gregorio is one of the founding members of the We Need Diverse Books campaign, so I applaud her efforts.  But I think it's obvious that Gregorio has a medical background and very few YA titles to her name.  Point more mature teen readers to Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides for additional reading on this theme.

Things We Know By Heart, by Jessi Kirby

In the opening moments of Things We Know By Heart, teenager Quinn wakes up to the distant sounds of sirens, and somehow she just knows they are for her boyfriend, Trent.  Skip ahead to over a year later, where Quinn is still deep in grief, not only over Trent's death, but over the future they will never have together.  A year later, and Quinn refuses to let herself move on or let go of Trent.  However, she writes donor letters to those people who received his organs, and she's heard back from all but one - the one who got Trent's heart.

Relentless and a bit obsessive, Quinn uses her best Internet sleuthing skills and figures out the recipient is a boy named Colton, about her age and living nearby.  Crossing all lines of acceptable behavior, Quinn goes to see him, intending to confront him, but she chickens out.  Instead, she befriends Colton and soon the two start spending more and more time together.  All the while, Quinn can't bring herself to tell Colton the truth.  Obviously, we as readers know everything will come out eventually, and it won't be pretty.

As YA romances go, I felt that Things We Know By Heart was pretty lightweight.  Colton is too much the Perfect Teenage Boyfriend.  He's cute, sensitive, outdoorsy... other than the fact that he still has to stop and take medication for his heart, Colton has few flaws.

There are many four star reviews for this book over on Goodreads, which completely baffles me.  It's hard for me to review books like this not from a grown-up point of view.  The adult in me just Really.Disliked.Quinn.  I know her boyfriend died tragically, and that's a sad thing.  But they weren't married.  They didn't have kids or a family together.  They were juniors in high school.  And although I'm sorry Quinn won't get to go to her prom with Trent or celebrate graduation with him, I just didn't feel very sympathetic toward her decision to just shut down and refuse to move on.  I think part of the problem is that we, as readers, don't get to know Trent as a character.  We just know a few fleeting details: he was an athlete, he once brought Quinn a huge sunflower.  I think if we had been invested more in their relationship, I would have cared about Quinn more. 

Colton, on the other hand, is the more interesting character, but Kirby makes this Quinn's story.  As Quinn begins to fall for Colton, she begins to heal emotionally and starts to move on with her life.

I'm sure there are plenty of teenage girls out there who will eat this up.  I think it would be an additional purchase for libraries, but not a necessary one.

Review given in exchange for an ARC from Edelweiss.  Book will be published in April.

Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman

I started reading Challenger Deep with little idea of what the book was about.  As soon as I saw that an ARC was available of the newest Neal Shusterman title, I was all GIMMEGIMMEGIMME *makes grabby hand motions*

And then I plunged right in.  That being said, I was then thoroughly confused for the first part of the book.  We begin by following two storylines involving a boy named Caden.  In one, he is a normal high school boy who likes art and drawing.  In the other story, he is a crew member on board a pirate ship with a captain, a navigator, and a talking parrot.

What is happening?  I'm so lost!  But of course I stuck with it, and very slowly the pieces began to fall into place. You realize that it's Shusterman's intentions to throw you into this confusing narrative, because that's how jumbled it feels in Caden's head.  He begins to struggle in school and starts slipping away from his friends and family.  His parents finally realize he needs help that they cannot give him and Caden is checked into a psychiatric institution for teens.  It is heartbreaking.

However, through the fog of Caden's mind, the reader realizes the pirate ship scenario is Caden's way of trying to make sense of his illness and the people around him at the institution.  How far into the abyss will he go?

An author's note at the end tells us that Challenger Deep was inspired by the similar journey of his son, Brendan, who supplies the illustrations in the novel.  Such personal insight makes Caden's story feel authentic and we are pulled in tightly to his struggle.  I found this book to be a surprising change of pace for Shusterman, who mostly traffics in sci-fi and fantasy, but I loved it.  Shusterman never disappoints.

Review given in exchange for a digital ARC from Edelweiss.  Book will be published in April 2015.

100 Sideways Miles by Andrew Smith

Where do I begin with this book?  It's so hard to describe in a way that doesn't sound drab.  It's about high school boys.  Okay...  They go on a road trip.  Sure.  There's a girl.  Naturally.

See what I mean?  100 Sideways Miles is a realistic, coming-of-age story filled with raunchy humor and sweet emotions all at the same time.  I've found this to be a hard sell in my library just because it's not really "about" anything specific.  But students who are willing to give it a shot will surely be rewarded.

High schooler Finn Easton has spent most of his life defined by two things:
1.  When he was a little boy, Finn and Mother were involved in a freak accident when a truck headed for the knackery overturned and a dead horse fell off the overpass onto them below.  It killed Finn's mother and left him with a broken back.  He still bears a scar from the accident and is epileptic.  He occasionally has seizures where he blanks out for minutes or hours at a time.
2.  His father wrote a science-fiction novel that amassed a cult following.  The main character is a boy named Finn.

Finn has few acquaintances other than his best friend, Cade, a beer-drinking, tobacco-chewing, profanity-spewing star of the baseball team.  He largely keeps to himself because people inevitably want to talk about his dad's book.  When he meets new student Julia, Finn finds himself falling in love for the first time.

There is much to like about this book.  I loved how funny Cade is and how good a friend he is to Finn.  For instance, one year before the state academic test, Cade convinces the entire sophomore class to just bubble in C-A-D-E over and over onto the answer sheet.  They perform so highly, the governor himself comes to the school to congratulate them on their outstanding academic achievement and gives them all an ice cream party.

I also like how real Finn seems as a character.  He's not particularly outgoing and often answers "Um," whenever asked a question he can't/doesn't want to answer.  As indicated by the title, the book is all about journeys - figurative and literal.  And no one takes a journey without coming out changed on the other side.

Vanishing Girls, by Lauren Oliver

Review given in exchange for a digital review copy from Edelweiss.

Vanishing Girl, the newest (to be released March 2015) from Lauren Oliver, switches POV between two sisters, Nick and Dara.  Both are close in age and look similar to each other, but their actions are far different.  Nick, the older sister, is more responsible, follows the rules, and looks out for Dara.  The younger sister, on the other hand, is sneaky, impulsive, and hiding secrets.  But perhaps, so is Nick?

The book revolves around a car crash: Nick was driving, Dara was badly hurt.  What happened, exactly, isn't revealed until the end.  Nick can't remember and Dara doesn't want to think about it.  The timeline jumps around ("Before" and "After") and also switches between both girls, which can sometimes make the plot fuzzy and hard to follow.  Of course, by the end of the book I realized this was probably Oliver's intention.

This is a story about sisters: how they love each other and resent each other all at the same time.  They're always competing, even if they don't realize it.  When Dara goes missing on her birthday, Nick begins a frantic chase to figure out where Dara disappeared to, leading to a surprising reveal.

After finishing this book, I thought, "Dang it.  Now I have to go back and read it again to see how I missed those clues."  I liked this one much better than Oliver's previous novel, Panic (see earlier blog post), although I think comparisons will be made to E. Lockhart's We Were Liars, which is similar.

Rabbit Ears, by Maggie De Vries

I started reading Rabbit Ears a few days ago; I had about half an hour left in my day, so I figured I would start one of the new books we just got in the library.  By the time the bell rang, I was so hooked that I brought the book home and finished it before I went to bed.

De Vries's novel goes back and forth between two sisters, Kaya and Beth.  Both are grieving over the loss of the father from cancer.  Beth takes solace in food, happily eating junk in the solitude of her room or in front of the tv.  Kaya sneaks out at night, hitchhiking rides to parties on the beach.  But Kaya's antics are more than just an expression of grief; she's also trying to cover up the pain of a much darker secret from her childhood.

One day at school, Kaya runs into a childhood friend, Diana, an encounter that threatens to bring past secrets to light.  Unable to cope with her feelings, Kaya convinces another girl, Michelle, to skip school with her and take a bus to a seedy part of town.  Before too long, Kaya is skipping school more than attending it, getting into more and more serious activities each time.  Soon Kaya has run away altogether, turning tricks downtown in order to support her next heroin fix.

Kaya's mother is worried about her child, but doesn't know what to do about her.  The adult in me wanted to yell at her.  "Find her!  Put her in treatment!  Don't let her out of your sight!"  Several times Kaya comes home and attempts to go back to school, but she continues to sneak off again. 

Author Maggie De Vries bases Rabbit Ears in part on the story of her sister, Sarah, whose story is similar to Kaya's.  Sarah eventually went missing and was never found.  Kaya ultimately gets a more satisfactory ending filled with hope.  However, De Vries's novel is not a cautionary tale with big moral lessons.  It feels real and should grab teens who are looking for realistic books with serious themes.  There are a few semi-explicit sexual situations in the book, making this best suited for older teens.  De Vries keeps the novel to just over 200 pages, making it an accessible choice for reluctant readers.

When I Was The Greatest, by Jason Reynolds

First of all, can I say that I love the cover art of this book?  There's no mistaking the shape of the gun, but it's... been yarn bombed?  What?

Everything on the cover comes into play in this quick, easy read by Jason Reynolds.  However, just because it's easily accessible does not mean it's not substantial.  Reynolds' debut novel is very impressive and he's worth watching for more things to come.

When I was the Greatest centers on Ali, 15 years old, living with his single mother and younger sister in a Brooklyn neighborhood prone to drugs and violence.  Ali, however, is a good kid.  He stays out of trouble, helps out a handicapped Vietnam vet (who in turn gives Ali boxing lessons, hence his nickname), and has a good relationship with his family.  His mother works two jobs, but doesn't put up with any foolishness.  Ali lives next door to two brothers, Needles and Noodles (the nicknames are a bit precious for this reviewer).  Their father is long gone, and their mother is often seen wearing tight, short clothes and getting into strange cars.  There's not often food at their house, so Ali's mother frequently invites them over.  Needles is a shy, quiet boy who suffers from Tourette Syndrome.  He has a violent, loud episode one evening on his front stoop, attracting the attention of the entire neighborhood.  To calm him down, Ali's mother gives Needles her knitting supplies.  By giving him something to focus on, his tics and outbursts become more manageable.

The thing I liked most about this book is that the characters all felt real.  The boys - largely good kids, but not without their flaws - get excited about the possibility to get into an exclusive party.  It's a place they are too young to be, but they have to learn that lesson the hard way, as many teens do.  It's a story about friendship and about what it means to step up and do the right thing.  Sometimes that's hard to do when your main obstacle is your best friend.

Another thing I liked about this book is that the adults also felt genuine.  Too often in YA lit, we find stories wherein teens seem to live a world of absentee parents, where - at the end of the book - the parents are like, "Wow!  I had no idea you were going through all that."  In this book, Ali takes many things upon himself, but in the end, his parents also step up and do the right thing by their children.  It was refreshing to read.

Author Jason Reynolds has another book due out in January, The Boy in the Black Suit.  I'm looking forward to his next release.

Book Review: Panic

Teenagers.  Deadly games.  One winner.  Sound familiar?  Thanks to the wild success of YA mega-hitters The Hunger Games and Divergent, we are at no short supply for teens-and-violence novels. The good news for Panic, the latest by Lauren Oliver, is that she steers clear of the sci-fi, dystopian genre, and grounds this book solely in the realistic, present day.  Panic has more in common with Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races, minus the magic water horses.  Panic is set in the small town of Carp, New York, a somewhat poor town where many dream of getting out, but few have the resources to do it.  Somewhere along the way, Carp's high school student body created a game called Panic.  Every student has to pay into the pot - or suffer the consequences.  Only graduated seniors are eligible to play.  The last man standing wins the pot.

Of course, the challenges are reckless and illegal.  The local cops have been itching to bust Panic for years.  Given that it kicks off at the same time and place every year, one would think the police would have figured out how to stop it before it starts.

Oliver switches back and forth between two players: Heather and Dodge.  Each has her (or his) own motivations for winning.  Heather lives with her druggie mother and innocent little sister in a trailer park. Winning Panic would pay for a way out of Carp.  Dodge is playing for revenge.  His older sister, Dayna, was injured and paralyzed playing Panic several years earlier.  Dodge wants payback.

My main problem with Panic is that neither Heather nor Dodge are sympathetic enough for me to really care about either one of them winning the game.  Unlike Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races, where I was truly torn between wanting Puck or Sean to win, Oliver didn't get me to fully invest in her main characters.  The other main issue with the book is that the challenges - although dangerous - aren't terrifying or frequent enough.  They come across as something you'd see on Fear Factor, if dreamed up by teens.  (One of the challenges involves running across a busy highway, blindfolded.  I kept hearing the movie Dodgeball in the back of my mind: "If you can dodge traffic, you can dodge a ball!")

Panic was a quick read for me, and I do enjoy Oliver's writing.  This would be a recommended addition for high school libraries where students are devouring Divergent and are asking, "What else do you have?"

Book Review: Fangirl

Confession time: When reviewing YA Lit, I always try to think about the book in terms of its primary audience - i.e., teens.  However, almost from the start, Fangirl hit me right in the gut.  Because it takes place during the college freshman year of its protagonist, the book brought up many memories and emotions for me.  I suppose that's what a good book is supposed to do, but this one in particular was like a trip down memory lane.

Fangirl follows Cath, a Nebraska freshman dreading her first year of college.  She's heading off to school with her twin sister, Wren, but Wren is eager to break free of the twin bond.  She's going to live in a different dorm, have a different roommate, a different major.  Cath is almost cripplingly anti-social, and her early weeks at college are painful.  She eats nothing but protein bars because she doesn't have friends to eat with and is too afraid to ask where the dining hall is.  She doesn't go out, and makes excuses when her roommate, Reagan, tries to invite her.  When she does go out on the rare occasion, she has nothing to wear except jeans, t-shirts, and cardigans.  Mostly, Cath nests in the comfort of her tiny dorm room and works on her online fanfiction novel.

So why did Fangirl get to me?  Because I WAS Cath my freshman year.  I went to school out of state so I knew no one and wasn't particularly outgoing.  I remember plenty of meals in the dining hall (at least I knew where it was), where I pretended to be studying to cover up for the fact that I was eating by myself.  I was afraid of breaking rules and going to parties.  I often turned in at a decent hour on a Friday night because I had nothing else to do.  I once attended a dance wearing jeans and a sweater because it was supposed to be "informal."  I didn't realize that "informal" meant short dresses instead of long ones.

Painful, right?  Yep.  I was a mess.  Luckily, I gained confidence in myself and snapped out of my hermit lifestyle, and so does Cath by the end of Fangirl, thanks in part to her roommate's friend Levi, who shows a genuine interest in Cath and her writing.

Author Rainbow Rowell, who also wrote the bittersweet Eleanor and Park, quite deftly pulls off a remarkable achievement with Fangirl.  She hasn't written just one book, but three.  First, there is the main story of Cath and her journey.  However, Cath is obsessed with a fantasy series called Simon Snow; the similarities to Harry Potter are obvious and intentional.  Between chapters of Fangirl, Rowell also writes excerpts from the fictitious Simon Snow series.  Additionally, she provides excerpts from Cath's fanfiction novel based on Simon Snow.  It shows Rowell's skill as a writer to invent three worlds and subtly manipulate the tone for each.

I enjoyed Fangirl, and can report that even though I thought about my own college experiences at first, I was able to let those go as the novel progressed, and invested in Cath and her struggles.  Rowell excels at creating relatable characters who don't always get endings wrapped up in a neat bow.  This would be a good choice to hand to high school seniors heading off to college, especially those introverted types who need reassurance that "it's going to be o.k."as they take the next step.